"Z Warrior Chronicles" is an independent project being worked on by Xatoku based off of the popular Dragonball Z franchise by Akira Toriyama.
This project has been going since early April 2011, and has gone through many revisions along the way, but the story elements are now being worked on and progress is booming.
The aim of this project is to emulate the Dragonball Z world in an Action/RPG type scenario,and tell the story of the Z Fighters as best it can. The gameplay is best described as a combination of Legacy of Goku 2 & Dragonball Z Sagas on the GBA & PS2 respectively, along with a
ton of Anime inspired gameplay elements as well.
Production is naturally at a slow but steady pace due to the development team being only me, but I've invested all of my free time into this project and have no intention on stopping any time soon.

So, I like Dragon Ball Z. I'm not sure why. Maybe it's because of the characters and idea of working towards what you get. Or maybe it's just because of the copious amounts of explosives and one-liners. What ever it is, it's awesome. Perhaps someday Z Warrior Chronicles will emit a similar feeling.

I like the Buu Saga the most, particularly because of the hidden themes behind all of characters, and instead of just getting more power, it goes deeper to touch on reasons why people are doing what they're doing. It sort of adds the depth to the characters that the other sagas were missing.

In some ways this is a bad thing, particularly with Piccolo. They go so far to show his turnaround as a good guy, which I thought was established in Namek, and his brainstorming capabilities, that they forget to give him a fight. Sure, there's the one with Babidi, but that hardly constitutes a fight. I like how they made him the main tactician and how he handles the battle on Earth however he can, using whatever luck they had left.

That's another thing I like about Buu Saga, how close to the edge they are. In Frieza Saga, Goku is on his way, in Cell Saga, he gives them 10 days to ready up. In Buu Saga, they're always at their wit's end, and of course Gohan is training at the Supreme Kai Planet, but they all think he'd dead so there's no expectation of a savior, and that's what the show needed -- some twist to make the generic formula better.

One thing I noticed with Gohan is that as he's joining the fight with Buu, he almost exactly recreates Goku's arrival to fight Frieza, suggesting that he's trying to be like his father and save the world all by himself. Unfortunately, he says the best line ever "I want to kill you" which contrasts Goku's honourable personality, hence why I think he loses the fight. He was a little too cocky for his own good, though still badass all the same :).

That seemed to be a recurring theme too, people trying to be like Goku. Gohan does it when he fights Buu, and Vegeta did it as well when he fought Fat Buu. He said something along the lines of not letting Kakarot get all the glory, but of course he died because of the contrast again. In the end, Goku is the only one who can be Goku, and Goku saves the world. Boom.

I definitely think the ending of DBZ is the best it could have been. Having the Earth save itself is the best ending to the series, and having Goku not do all the work is a plus. I would have liked to see Vegeta kick a little more ass than he did, but he did put up a decent enough fight so it's fine by me.

But then they make GT and everything I know about the world dies and every human's mind is declared broken and sent to the scrap heap.

What a dumb idea, really. Who in the fuck would want to continue DBZ? Especially with the lack of a reference material. It's dog shit. The only thing I liked about it was the look of SSJ4 Goku, who will definitely be making a Z Warrior Chronicles appearance.

As for the fans who want the GT story in... lol.

It could have been acceptable though. SSJ6vegeta and I once talked about the many ways GT could have been made better, and I think if the changes were made it could have been a nice spin-off. Still not canon of course, but a fun watch was definitely probable.

First off, it would have to be longer. I know some people don't like filler, but that's what YouTube is for -- to get past the bullshit. I am watching to develop my characters and get reasons as to why they are fighting, which in turn makes the fights more interesting to me. Without this, GT has little to no character development and what we get are these seemingly pointless scraps which last 1-2 episodes.

I don't know about you guys/gals, but Earth being destroyed was a pivotal moment for me and developing Buu the way they did really made me feel the decrease in remorse for killing him. I could visually see that he was becoming worse and worse, and my anticipation to see his defeat rose with this. That is great character development, and GT just didn't develop it the same way.

Take Baby for example. First off, stupid name. Secondly, he was actually pretty neat. His skill was interesting and his look was unique and intriguing. His creation could have been tied into the universe more, but he was still interesting enough to enjoy, had it not been for the story. If his Saga was let's say... 30 episodes longer, I could have enjoyed it.

Goku should have never gone Super Saiyan 4, and never turned into a kid. They tried to recreate the original Dragon Ball, but that is impossible so when they realized they had fucked up, they made Goku an adult again. Oops, too late. Nobody cares anymore so you fucked it.

I would have liked the Black Dragon Ball Saga too be more about the Z Fighters getting back into action for their own reasons, which sort of draws them together when the threat comes. They should have scrapped the Dragon Balls altogether and focus more on their reliance on them to be more of a burden. Something like fucking up a wish, or just some way to show that because they rely so heavily on the Dragon Balls, they will be their own destruction.

A sweet side plot in the beginning could be Vegeta trying to reach Super Saiyan 3. That would have been awesome. If it worked sort of like a throwback to when he tried to reach the first Super Saiyan, I would have loved to see it. And maybe the training gets him really tough, but he just can't do it. The idea that he would quit fighting all together is ridiculous.

Meanwhile, Goku could have just finished his training with Uub, like in GT. And goes home to finally live with his family for the rest of his life. Then they could play with the theme that Goku can't quit, because there will always be a challenge for him, and invoke the villain here. Who do we invoke though?

Vegeta could reflect on his training as a Super Saiyan and try to put himself through that level of difficulty again by going into space, and THEN we can have the Baby parasite latch onto him. We'd name him something far more awesome of course, but it could be a metaphor for Vegeta's motives to pass or at least match Goku's skill to be his downfall.

So Vegeta brings back Baby, perhaps having reached Super Saiyan 3, but perhaps not. Maybe when he reaches it, he could see why Goku had such a tough time sustaining it, and then realizes how much time he's been wasting, goes back to Earth and then Baby latches onto the pod.

Vegeta could confront Goku about the usage of Super Saiyan 3, and maybe now he wants to test his strength against him as his equal. See what I mean? Give some purpose to reaching a new transformation oppose to just having it as some arbitrary gap filler.

As for who Baby would take over, it's anybody's guess. I wouldn't say Vegeta because he already was controlled by Babidi. Perhaps Baby could watch them as they are having their new battle due to Vegeta's new found confidence, and then Goku could have a slight edge when Baby decides to take him over Vegeta. Give people what they want with a twist. He could choose Vegeta and then as viewers we're like "But Vegeta was already controlled, what the hell?" but when he switches his choice to Goku we're like "Oh fuck."

So now that we have a Goku-Baby (lol) we have a villain to work with. We have Vegeta being the strongest person to take him, but obviously Baby will amplify his strength due to DBZ rules. And all of the Z Fighters are pathetic.

Piccolo could have been training since he sensed a darkness returning with Vegeta, and started getting back into shape. Being that close to Space could easily make this work. As for everyone else, I would say Tien would keep training. Krillin is getting older, but he could shave his head as a metaphor for his return. 18 would have kept training, but Gohan, Trunks, Goten, and Yamcha are probably weak as hell now.

I like Yamcha in a way of his own, but I'd cut him here. He lost me in the Android Saga, so I'd say he's pretty much done.

A neat twist could be Baby manipulating everyone to believe he's Goku, whilst Vegeta knows the truth and rallies the Z Fighters for support. Vegeta leading a rebellion does seem odd, but I believe it could work if done right. Oh crap, we have Pan too. She'd probably be a bit older now, and we could in turn make Gohan have to stay in some sort of shape to train her while Goku was gone. Boom.

See? Just stuff like that. Showing reasons why the characters are doing what they're doing and then naturally let the story fill in it's own gaps. The above example is merely just a brainstorm, and won't be slapped onto the end of ZWC or anything, but I just wanted to give an idea of why I don't like GT instead of me just saying I am too lazy to add it afterward.

I wouldn't ever suggest somebody take the story past Z, but I know that it could have been done.

That's why I am trying to combine all of the story elements taking place in the respective times, like doing the Supreme Kai episodes first, just to make the story feel universal by creating motivation for the characters and such. I have the control to have the story play out however I see fit, so instead of doing the representation that the Anime did, I am making the story feel seamless as one entire story being told oppose to 4.

The way I plan on doing cutscenes will help convey this story far better than a pre-rendered tech demo. Not to say that I don't want them to look and feel good, but I want them to not feel arbitrary either. I say don't do any cutscenes that don't look exactly like the game, or aren't in-game their self because then you're wasting your time, and pissing off your players.

If you didn't get last week's release by the way, you can grab it here.

It's not the full-super-mega-death release I have promised, but because some people can't download the older versions, I uploaded what I have so far. It has the new map style, the energy grabbing, and some new camera effects. Not much, but you asked for it =P.

Please, tell me how the new maps are working/looking. I am trying the export/import style oppose to making them in Unity just for the control and the overall better look. One thing that came up was the idea that the maps should be large and seamless, or remove flying and smaller.

Skatter brought up the justification that there's no point in flying if we are limited by unrealistically large cliffs and invisible barriers, which I sort of agreed with. I believe that is totally true, but one thing we can do to get around that is give the illusion of limitation. If I have the low raised cliffs assumed by your brain as boundaries instead of having just a distorted plane with invisible walls, you won't be as disappointed/confused when I block you off where they end. If I can give you the subliminal idea that the map ends here, then you won't get pissed when you find out yourself, and probably won't try to fly past them in the first place. If you tried to fly past them without that assumption and got blocked off, it would give a slight rage inducing effect that comments this telling me to make it open world.

I still have to make the animated clouds, skydome, and foliage, but the map is finished for the most part.

Please, tell me what you think. Environments are one of the most important things I have to do, so if any ideas pop into your heads that can help vary and fill up the maps, give me a shout and I'll try to see what I can do, assuming they're good ideas.

That covers up this week. I'm trying to get back into longer posts despite the amount of random bullshit I type, but one thing to mention is that I'm going for a weekend release, not necessarily Fridays. Don't worry, there won't be a progression to every two weeks, once a month, never. I'm just pacing myself.

To Do List: Animate Goku, Model/Animate Piccolo/Raditz/Chi Chi/Gohan, Make New Cutscenes, Fix Up Gameplay Some More, Clean the Maps, Create the Hub-World, Make a New List.